Maize-N-Brew: Michigan shaping into a Harbaugh-type team

Anthony Broome is a writer at the Wolverines blog Maize-n-Brew. His opinions do not necessarily reflect those of the Detroit Free Press nor its writers. Read his column every week here and contact him anytime at abroome1110@gmail.com.

Michigan has had its fair share of ups and downs this year so far, but it has been more good than bad with the team sitting at 2-1. Through three weeks of the Wolverines' 2015 season, one thing is apparent above everything else.

Players are already taking on the personality of head coach Jim Harbaugh. There is an edge to this team that we have not seen in quite some time and it starts right at the top.

Harbaugh was asked about if he is satisfied on the timing between the wide receivers and quarterback Jake Rudock. The answer he gave echoes the attitude that the program has taken on in the last ten months or so.

"'Satisfied' is not a word I'm ever going to use," he said after Saturday's game. "It's never a word I'm going to associate with football. It's a confusing word. It's like 'comfortable.' I just don't ever associate it with football.

"We're always trying to improve. Never satisfied. Never been satisfied, and there's not too many players that are satisfied when it comes to football."

An example of how the team has adopted this came late in the win over UNLV when the Wolverines gave up a late touchdown with the game in hand.

Any time you play a team that does not have a chance, it can be easy to get complacent waiting for the clock to run out. Defensive end Mario Ojemudia was not happy that Michigan took a series off late in the game and allowed a score, which ended the shutout.

"As a defense, we want to play to our expectations, not to our opponent's," he said. "Giving up that touchdown was unacceptable because we were the better team all day and just needed to keep that going and not play down to our competition."

This a far cry from last year, where former Wolverine wideout Devin Funchess said that wins and losses were "just a statistic."

This team has its fair share of flaws. Week-to-week improvement is something that many have circled as a key to this season, and it has been there. The run game and offensive line are coming along nicely and the defense continues to pick up where it left off last year while forcing more turnovers.

Quarterback play is still a concern, especially since there is no apparent backup plan if Rudock's struggles continue. He has played poorly, but he is not going anywhere. Shane Morris is likely going to redshirt and Wilton Speight looks like the only quarterback on the roster that will play this year.

At the end of the day, Harbaugh is not concerned about how they get there, but what the final result is when the dust clears. Winning is the ultimate criteria for his quarterbacks.

"I guess I'm not as concerned with statistics as (the media seems) to be," Harbaugh said. "We'll just keep striving to get better in every area. There's definitely some areas of improvement for our football team, which I was pleased with."

They will continue to get better as the year goes on. Will it result in wins in their biggest games? That remains to be seen, but the staff is putting players in situations where they can succeed and adjusting to what they have.